Stephen Beer (www.stephenbeer.com)

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Roger Bootle on Tory economic plans - they could clobber the recovery

"A Conservative government could cut too hard. They may put up taxes quite a lot and that could clobber the recovery. You need a clear plan to reduce the deficit, but need to do it gradually. I'm more worried about deficits than the national debt.

"If you get deficits down gradually and let the economy grow, debt will improve over time. After the Napoleonic wars and the second world war debt was at 250% of GDP. It is much lower than that now."

Gradually perhaps the conventional wisdom that we have to aggressively reduce public sector debt is eroding.